


Making A Friend

by sunshinestealer



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: M/M, tagged for violence bc Kevin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-21
Updated: 2016-07-21
Packaged: 2018-07-25 21:11:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7547383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunshinestealer/pseuds/sunshinestealer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Carlos meets Kevin while wandering.</p>
<p>(Please note I have not caught up since about episode... 60 or so? Just let me enjoy these two guys doing their thing.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Making A Friend

Another day in the Desert otherworld.

Carlos sighed and notched another marking in his notebook with the writing utensils that would have been contraband back in Night Vale. The tally lines had gone over pages and were almost filling up half the notebook. He didn't know why, but he'd continued to wander in this place, despite instinctually knowing that he probably had a better chance of being rescued if he'd simply stayed in the same spot where he'd originally fallen in. It was a fascinating place to explore - even if he didn't understand why he was so drawn to adventuring here - and were this any  _normal_ desert, he would have died from dehydration and exposure by now. But something in him had kept him going, all this time.

Maybe... the chance of seeing Cecil again?

He sighed and shook his head. That was going to be an awful can of worms to open when ( _if_ ) he got back to Night Vale. The times he'd had reception on his phone and forgotten to call... The times he was too taken by wanderlust (and the potential scientific applications of this place!) to simply text a few messages to his boyfriend... Cecil's anxieties were probably doing a number on him back in the real world, and Carlos felt terrible for it.

So he'd called him a few times. Cecil was always overjoyed to hear his voice, but on Carlos' end... He pinched the bridge of his nose - it was a _fact_ that the relationship was breaking up from the sheer distance of being trapped in an alternate dimension. Cecil was loyal, certainly, but Carlos felt worse and worse as he recorded more days in his journal. There had to come a point where they'd have to deal the bad news to each other. And Carlos didn't fancy his chances.

Sometimes he came across a friendly face out in the otherworldly desert. Well. Not a super  _attractive_ face. Carlos was more a 'names' person when it came to remembering people, but he'd somehow mapped out every nook and cranny of Cecil's face in his memory. Every little contour and hollow, the way his cheeks and eyes lit up when he was pecked on the cheek, that rumbling noise of contentment when Carlos embraced him, the first slide of his tongue against Cecil's...

The friendly face had introduced themselves thusly. "Oh, how terribly  _imperfect_ you are!"

_Imperfect...?_

Carlos was about to argue how subjective that term could be, but he wasn't about to argue with a doppelgänger of Cecil who had no eyes and... ketchup stains all over his clothing. And that terrible smile.

When the hand was proffered, Carlos hesitated a moment before taking it. He wished he hadn't, as sharp nails raked down his wrist (but thankfully didn't draw blood) before pumping his arm with a little too much vigour.

"It's adorable," the monster wearing Cecil's face had insisted. " _You're_ adorable. But imperfect. Which is downright ugly if you ask me."

"Right..." Carlos said, giving a firm handshake back.

Kevin cocked his head, as if trying to work something out. "Your haircut certainly doesn't help with the... imperfection. But that's okay. I'm sure someone out there loves it, y-"

"You're the Desert Bluffs radio host, right?" Carlos asked, interrupting. "Keith?"

_"Kevin_." The creature said, with a slight huff.

Carlos wisely decided to make sure that Kevin had finished talking before he started the conversation again. "Right, that's it! I've, er, listened to your show a few times."

"Really?"

"Yes, really." Carlos said. He only narrowly avoided making some quip about how he'd found the broadcast 'imperfect'. But, of course, he valued getting back to Cecil in one piece. Even if it was going to be to impart the bad news of their break-up.

Kevin sat down, cross-legged, and invited Carlos to sit opposite him, almost pulling the scientist down by the sleeves of his lab coat. He was still examining and scrutinising the face of Night Vale's leading scientist. Every dark freckle, every bump (from a broken nose), every wrinkle and every little dent in the skin. And those two blunt teeth that rested on his lip...

Although he couldn't see quitewhat Kevin was looking for (due to the lack of eyes) in his face, Carlos was aware of some... feeling of being searched. On some deep, intrinsic level. Like Kevin was quickly running him through a computer programme, analysing for faults in code and generating a report to the end-user on how they could be fixed.

As inhuman as Kevin was, though... it was the sole contact Carlos had had in weeks.

He made the bold decision to rest his hands atop Kevin's claws.

"So... Uh. You know a way to get out of here?"

Kevin broke out of his reverie of staring at Carlos, and looked around the sky. "I've just been... wandering. Unproductively."

"Is there any other way  _of_ wandering?" Carlos asked.

The monster took a moment to think. Carlos remembered the Desert Bluffs radio host as being a lot more chatty and optimistic than this. The desert otherworld really took a toll on the people trapped within its realm.

Sitting across from the beast, Carlos noticed a foul odour. Not the kind that one gets used to after a long time spent in the biology labs at college or practicing poor personal hygiene whilst making a breakthrough in science.

It was the stench of blood and viscera.

Oddly, he didn't recoil from Kevin. Even though the smell was putrid, it didn't turn his stomach. The radio host sat across from him was just  _too much like Cecil_ for that to matter.

A thousand thoughts battled with each other in his mind. This wasn't just unfair to Cecil, it was unfair to Kevin. What if this monster really thought they had a chance together? Sharp, porcelain-white teeth had clacked together in a joyed smile as he drank in Carlos' appearance. The scientist may have been ugly to him, but from the change to his expression...

Carlos' mouth hung open unintentionally. What the hell even  _was_ Night Vale? And Desert Bluffs, for that matter? How had nobody documented both the town's oddities over the years? The fact that they were strange mirror images of each other, with Kevin looking like Cecil's eyeless, bloody twin...

"So... I'm Cecil Palmer's boyfriend," he said, finally averting his gaze from Kevin with a deep sigh. "Or was. Might be." He shouldn't have felt this comfortable relating his relationship status to such a monster.

"Oh, I  _know_ ," Kevin replied. "Such a beautiful  _co-inky-dink_. You see, I have my very own Carlos."

"Of... of course you do," Carlos said, rolling his eyes. Not out of scorn for Kevin, but more irritation at how Night Vale kept resisting attempts at rational scientific study. The moment he thought he'd gotten his head screwed on and his research was progressing at an admirable rate, the town and its rules suddenly decided to change. And everybody was just  _so nonchalant_ about it all!

"Ricardo," Kevin breathed, bringing Carlos out of his thoughts by digging his claws in enough to sting. "But then he had to ruin everything."

"He did?" Carlos asked, curious.

"Mm-hmm! He  _ran away!"_

Well. Carlos couldn't exactly blame Ricardo for packing up his car and driving back to the haven of some place without any of the eldritch weirdness that was simply par for the course in Night Vale and Desert Bluffs. For now, he was glad that Kevin didn't seem like he was going to hurt him.

"I... See. I'm sorry to hear that."

"Oh, you're not sorry," Kevin said with a little laugh. "But that's okay." He relaxed his posture, no longer tense and trying to display dominance. "The Smiling God has our existences all planned out for us. It's just a shame that Ricardo couldn't come to know how  _glorious_ life is in the Bluffs. But I'm sure there was a reason for it, divine or otherwise!"

Carlos breathed, feeling more at ease with Kevin. For some reason. Why could he imagine Cecil speaking in this same cadence, with the same facial mannerisms?

When they found themselves leaning into each other, Carlos' mind briefly panicked. Kevin was some form of humanoid monster, and he was just a regular guy.

A regular guy with a relationship that was coming apart at the seams. He found tears searing from the corners of his eyes as he kissed Kevin the same way he had once kissed Cecil.

Kevin could have taken every opportunity to become as violent as the blood splatters on his clothing and the stink of viscera suggested. But he was gentle,  _so_ gentle. Carlos could hardly believe it as their bodies pressed together, and Kevin kept looking at him in that same scrutinising way, willing to stop if this ever got too out of Carlos' comfort zone. Which it was, certainly, considering Cecil's position in this whole affair - but that was on the periphery of his mind for now.

Carlos breathed at the first bite to his neck, especially the soft scrape of Kevin's fangs. He found Kevin's shirt alluringly unbuttoned, and used his hands to explore the planes of his body. Which Kevin seemed to delight in, his grin becoming ever more manic as he leaned back over Carlos to continue kissing him.

A nip at the ear was a soft reminder from Kevin if he should continue some moments later, as pressed together and heated as they were. Carlos nodded, coming around from the daze he had just momentarily been in.

"Still imperfect and ugly?" He quipped, his hips rolling to meet Kevin's.

"A little...  _less so_ ," Kevin conceded.

  

* * *

 

It was not to last, however. Carlos had barely started to button up his shirt and pull his coat back on when Kevin had simply disappeared, like a mirage. The guilt had come crashing over him like a wave.

He thought it was going to be hard to tell Cecil that they were breaking up. And he hadn't committed any extra-marital transgressions back then!

Now, with... with  _Kevin_ , who knew what would happen? His mind raced with anxiety, and he took out his phone. Missed calls, texts and What's App messages that were desperately trying to keep in touch with him. And his phone at full signal and full battery, as ever.

He sighed and drew his free hand down his face.

Then he pulled up his list of contacts, trying to swallow down the guilt and make that call.

Another day passed in the desert otherworld.

And Carlos didn't call.


End file.
